atonement.

i forgot how much i loved this film.

projections.

by raf simons.

my apartment.

surprisingly, i don't think i ever showed you guys my apartment. i could back track a bit and tell you about my terrible experience getting from point a (cité universitaire which was a dorm) to point b (my apartment), but i will spare you the trouble and show you what i ended up with!

i'm sharing my apartment with a roomie from spain and the layout would be similar to ivory tower? except it is one person to each room instead of a quad. i'm super lucky that i found this apartment through fusac and it is in a great location! in the marais and next to place des vosges. 

here are some pictures: 

i borrowed a fisheye from a norwegian friend of mine. trust me, the fisheye was needed because of how small the space was. 

my room.

picnic.

film featuring chara.

this film was beautiful.

synopsis:

Coco, Tsumuji and Satoru, three mental asylum patients want to see the world, being not allowed behind the border of the asylum. Therefore they start to explore the world by walking on the wall, soon finding themselves in the outside ambience. But they still believe its right what they are doing because they are staying on the wall. When Coco and Tsumuji walk near a church, they meet a priest who gives them a bible, to help them believe in god. Misinterpretating a part, they think that the end of the world is near. Excited to watch this armageddon, they head for another trip into the outside world, finding a place to have a picnic and watch the final event.

[edit]

laurie.

i remember about 4 years ago, as i was waiting in line outside st ann's warehouse, i was thinking to myself. OMG I GET TO SEE DAMIEN RICE & BLONDE REDHEAD! but that was during my senior year of high school and i didnt really find my type of 'music' yet. not to say that i dont like damien rice anymore or even blonde redhead...which is totally false because blonde redhead would always be one of my 'favorites'.

in the concert, i also saw lou reed and finally, laurie anderson. she was a bit wacko. as i'm trying to remember right now, i was actually feeling embarassed for her when she walked on stage with her midis and laptop. i don't even know why i felt that way. sometimes when someone does something that i don't think the 'others' would like i automatically get this feeling of getting embarased for them as if i was on stage making a fool out of myself. but i was wrong that day. laurie started her drum machine and whipped out the 'talking stick' that she invented during the warhol years and she was amazing!  i was so surprised and i began to love her.

in fact, she was added to my weird repertoire of what i call the 'middle-aged ladies' that i keep falling on. in case you are wondering, they consists of:

jane birkin
francoise hardy
laurie anderson
marianne faithful
kim carnes
vashti bunyan
mary hopkins
zouzou

well, here is a clip of the song entitled 'expert' that she sang during the concert.






well, most of you would think this: SHES SO 80s ELECTRONIC


actually she was and she is still awesome.


her hit:







now that i think about it, i think that concert really influenced what i listen to today.


i saw antony from antony & the johnsons that day, blonde redhead, david byrne, lou reed, & blonde redhead.


during damien rice's set, glen hansard from 'once' also made a cameo appearance.

lee lozano's 'real money' piece.

here was the piece that i found the most interesting when i saw lozano's exhibit in stockholm.

updates. morocco & sweden

hello everyone.

sorry for the lack of updates. i've been actually having fun this past semester as some of you can tell by the lack of posts. not to say that in the event of a constant barrage of posts translates to boredom, but the past few weeks has been pretty busy for me.

exposés (typical sciences po), the break, and finally stockholm last week.


the break was pretty awesome. my sidekick norwegian has a house in aix-en-provence and we ended up going down there with a bunch of friends and it was a blast.

highlights from the first few nights of cooking or as facebook would put it, 'a night of mayhem'.

o rly now?

i swear, we didn't plan the beach house cover.

da family portrait. 

next, maria, katherine and i went to casablanca & marrakech. it was such an awesome experience. it was my first time going to an islamic country and everything was beautiful. while in casablanca and marrakech, we stayed in the "old part" of both cities. the colours were beautiful in morocco and now i know why even ysl bought a house there. 

some highlights:

some of you guys asked me about my pictures that i posted a week ago on my other blog. actually, if you like them, it was not because of my 'newly found photographic' skills, it was actually all a surprise for me until i opened up aperture on my mac. 

being only 'slightly' nerdy... i went to my usual rounds of dp preview & other leica blogs and i found some accounts of photography in morocco. like most islamic countries, most women & children do not want pictures taken by tourists. since i really wanted to capture the local people during my trip, i decided to wrap my camera around my neck and literally pressed the shutter with every passing person. 

however, problems quickly arose when i reviewed my first picture because i keep forgetting, the m system on my leica is completely manual in terms of focusing. so throughout the trip, the only 'skill' that i exerted on the photos were my shaky depth perception as i guestimated if the passing person was 8 feet away from me or actually 3 feet closer.

like my trip to beijing two years ago with my family, i've quickly realized that i'm attracted to old locks. maybe its because of how antiquated it looks or the colour composition of it. i really do like the old metal clasps along with the faintly painted wooden door. 

and the next week? sweden!

stockholm was definitely another animal. i was able to dress better with my "parisian wear" and wasn't at all going back to my "bo ho chic" of marrakech.

stockholm was a bit of a test actually. since i haven't been back since last year with my family and i don't know even a bit of swedish, i expected it to be a bit tough. 

during the trip, i discovered that alec & i are pretty similar and we ended up doing very little "touristy" things and ended up vintage & record shopping. 

not to mention the amazing food with had there:

my food journey began in the airport.

for people that know me, i eat. actually, i eat a lot. and also, im a CARNIVORE. these, however, are not meatballs. in fact, this was in a vegetarian restaurant called chutney in soldermalm, stockholm. i'm not gonna lie, these vegetarian meatballs tasted like the real thing and it was a lot better than our favorite swedish warehouse, ikea.

eat cunt for mental health? ahh what? THAT TERRIBLE C WORD????

well, it was actually an exhibit that we saw in the stockholm modern musset. while i didn't appreciate her drawings of 'cocks' & 'vaginas' as much, i really enjoyed lozano's social experiments.

i will post lozano's piece on the next entry.